You that but seek your modest rolls and coffee, When you have passed the bar, and have saluted Its watchful madam, then pray enter softly The inner chamber, even as one who treads The haunts of mating birds, and watch discreetly Over your paper’s edge. There in the corner, Obscure, ensconced behind the uncovered table, A man and woman keep their silent tryst. Outside the morning floods the pavement sweetly; Yonder aloft a maid throws back the shutters; The hucksters utter modulated cries As wistful as some old pathetic ballad. Within the brooding lovers, unaware, Sit quiet hand in hand, or in low whispers Communicate a more articulate love. Sometimes she plays with strings and, gently leaning Against his shoulder, shows him childish tricks. She has not touched the glass of milk before her, Her breakfast and the price of their admittance. She has a look devoted and confiding And might be pretty were not life so hard. But he, gaunt as his rusty bicycle That stands against the table, and with features So drawn and stark, has only futile strength. The love they cherish in this stolen meeting Through all the day that follows makes her sweeter, And him perhaps it only leaves more bitter. But you that have not love at all, old men That warm your fingers by this fire, discreetly Play out your morning game of dominoes.
Sitting in his rocker waiting for your tea, Gazing from his window, this is what you see:
A cat that snaps at flies; a track leading down By log-built shanties gray and brown;
The corner of a barn, and tangled lines of fence Of rough-hewn pickets standing dense;
The ghost of a tree on a dull, wet day; And the blanket fog where lies the bay.
But when he’s seen the last of you, Sitting in his rocker, what’s _his_ view?
(For there he sits, day in, day out, Nursing his leg—and his dreams, no doubt.)
The snow-slide up behind the _gaard_; The farm beside old Trondjem _fjord_;
Daughters seven with their cold blue eyes, And the great pine where his father lies;
The boat that brought him over the sea; And the toothless woman who makes his tea.
(Their picture, framed on the rough log wall, Proves she had teeth when he was tall.)
He sees the balsam thick on the hill, And all he’s cleared with a stubborn will.